More on John Freshwater, the guy mentioned in Backwoods Sleuth’s #14 above.

A summation from Wiki:

John Freshwater (born June 22, 1956) is a former science teacher at Mount Vernon Middle School in Mount Vernon, Ohio, who was dismissed by the Board of Education for teaching creationism in a public school, and using a Tesla coil to “mark the shape of the cross into the arms of eighth grade students”.[2]

Freshwater was suspended without pay and requested a public administrative hearing, which began in October 2008 and concluded in January 2011 with the hearing referee recommending the school board terminate Freshwater’s teaching contract. One week later, the Board terminated Freshwater’s contracts. Additionally, Freshwater was involved with two federal court cases regarding the accusations, one brought against him by the student who claimed “Mr. Freshwater burned a cross” into his arm,[3] which was settled out of court, and in the other Freshwater sued his employers, which he later withdrew. Freshwater appealed his termination, but the appeals were denied by two different appeal courts and the Supreme Court of Ohio.

Using the Tesla coil to “burn” the cross into a students arm was his first big deal that made Ohio news. And once that launched him, his crusade was on.

Here is a good link to a New York Times Article on him:

Teacher With Bible Divides Ohio Town

A bit from that NY Times piece:

One high school teacher said she consistently had to reteach evolution to Mr. Freshwater’s students because they did not master the basics. Another testified that Mr. Freshwater told his students they should not always take science as fact, citing as an example a study that posited the possibility of a gene for homosexuality.

“Science is wrong,” Mr. Freshwater was reported as saying, “because the Bible states that homosexuality is a sin, and so anyone who is gay chooses to be gay and is therefore a sinner.”

A third teacher testified that Mr. Freshwater advised students to refer to the Bible for additional science research.

School officials said Mr. Freshwater’s science classroom was adorned with at least four copies of the Ten Commandments and several other posters that included verses from Scripture.

Hopefully this final appeal at the Ohio Supreme Court will be the last we hear of him, but I doubt it. Wouldn’t surprise me if he turned this into a political career.